This Whole Memory Thing
by KnightedRogue
Summary: Ben asks Han about his deceased aunt.
1. Default Chapter

"**This Whole Memory Thing"**

**KR**

I've never got the confiding part right. It just doesn't work with me. You'd think after three kids and a nephew I woulda figured it out by now. I'm not even sure _why_ someone would want to talk to me or ask questions. Everyone always knows everything anyway. There's no quant family stories I can share they can't just look up on the holonet, no funny little moments that some holojournalist didn't record. It didn't work that way.

But that's the problem with heroics, ya know?

So when Ben went and asked me the question that I never wanted to answer, I couldn't say anything. I froze. Ben musta thought he'd get in trouble – he looked uneasy and kinda shuffled back. His eyes were still on mine though, so I couldn't just ignore him. I sat down and opened my arms. He came running up and jumped into my lap. (Gods, how long has it been since Jace or Jaina did that?) He sat with his face towards me, expecting an answer, I guess.

So I leaned back and tried to talk. I didn't get very far before I stopped. In fact, I probably just managed the name, I'm not sure. I was kinda caught up in memories. When I got back to reality, I glanced down at the kid again. Still waiting.

Alright.

Lemme tell you about your aunt, kid. Whadd'ya want to know? How she looked? How she lived? How she died? What?

He grinned and asked me to tell me how she lived. He told me that he'd seen a holo in his parent's room, that he _knew_ how she looked. He didn't need to _see_ her, he already did.

Maybe he didn't need to see her, but I sure did.

I ignored the tightening in my chest and smiled at the kid. He looked a lot like Luke, even at seven. And he acts like 'em, too. Stupid kid tries to throw everything at me with that Force of his. Maybe that's more like his mother, though.

I thought for a sec, then told him she was a princess.

He interrupted me and told me he _knew_ that, too, and didn't need to hear that. Asked me if I knew anything else besides what his mom and dad told him.

Kid, I could write a book.

So I asked him what his mom and dad had told him, thinking that they prolly gave him the watered down version. How do you tell a kid about genocide, anyway?

He said that she was a princess and lived there until she met his dad and me and we took her to Yavin.

Yep. No explosions or torture in that one.

He kept goin' on about how she was his dad's best friend and really pretty and all – he _knew_ that from that stupid holo of her – and that she was brave and smart and funny. He told me that she was president for awhile and she helped with that 'Vong war.'

That _Vong _war?

A lot more happened in that Vong war than you'll ever have to know, kid.

He said that he'd never seen her and was wonderin' who she was. I mean, he said he knew she was _dead_ and all, but he never met her. Did he?

So I told him that, yeah, he'd met her when he was little and that she'd been pretty excited about it. She'd been waiting for years for Luke to have a kid, was so happy that Luke could experience that parenting stuff. She said she'd felt guilty about me and her and that she wanted him to be happy.

I didn't tell him that.

He was looking up at me again. He asked me to tell him stuff about her that he hadn't heard. Stuff that _I_ knew and was funny.

Like me and her had always had easy times. That nothing was ever wrong.

I started with that, telling him that she hated me at first, that she had hung out with Luke and Chewie and I a lot on the Falcon – his eyes got big at the mention of the ship - and that she'd liked him a whole lot better than she had liked me. He started to ask me why, then stopped and said, in a very-like Mara voice, that it was because she knew his dad and her were twins. I told him kinda carefully that they didn't know that yet, that she just plain liked him better.

He asked me why.

I stammered for awhile, trying to think of somethin' to say. Why didn't she treat me like she treated Luke?

Because she loved _me_.

I told him that her and I fought a lot and that his dad was nicer to her than I was. He just shrugged and asked me what else I could tell him. I told him that her and I got married and had Jace and Jaina and Ani. His eyes got bigger again at Ani's name. The kid must have an obsession for the martyrs in our family.

His got an open field – there's a lot of 'em.

That was about all I thought I'd have to say. Seven year olds aren't interested in personal stuff. He would stop, right?

Wrong. He asked me _why_ she wasn't here anymore.

That was when I decided Luke should come back.

I collected myself, thinking about how to answer that question. It's hard tryin' to make sense of it for most of us, how d'ya explain it to a child? He doesn't even remember her, can't think about her and be sorry. Or regret.

So I tell him the old lies that we always told the kids: that she loved him, but that it was just her time. She left and she's better now. Peaceful. He kinda stared at me long and hard and looked like he was judging me.

Apparently he got what he asked for. Or whatever. He jumped off my lap and started towards his room, ready to go back to toys and games, but then he turned back and said something weird.

He said that he was sorry for _me._

What kind of seven year old thinks that way? His eyes closed and he stood there, all twisted up and half-way through the doorway. Then he opened his eyes and shouted a goodbye and left.

And I sat there and thought about it. Some little kid feels sorry for me? Am I showing it that much? I shouldn't be, it's been six years. People don't mope around for that long and some stupid kid sure as hell doesn't feel sorry for _anyone_. Maybe he picked it up from his parents. I'm sure they're always saying stuff like that about me.

I'm the hurt one, the one that can't let go.

Could he tell? Tell that I don't sleep as well anymore? That my kids hurt to look at? That without Leia, I'm kinda aimless?

That I volunteer to watch him because he takes my mind away from memories, those memories that hurt so bad I can't think for about an hour after remembering 'em? That every time I see her, I see her in pain? Dying?

That sometimes I wish I could, too?

I got up and pushed a hand through my hair and started down the hallway towards his bedroom. The kid takes my mind off these things. Away from Chewie and Anakin and Leia. Those people he doesn't remember, never knew. Never will know.

Maybe he's a good influence.

Or maybe I just want to be a kid again, too.

Or maybe I'm just wasting time until I can either face up to the past or get on with the future. Because it sucks, this whole limbo thing.

This whole memory thing.


	2. Chapter 2

AN: Another older story posted elsewhere ... if FFN is my archive, I have to keep it up to date, don't I?

Yes, well. This is an itty bit I wrote as a meme; Liesel Solo requested another bit for "This Whole Memory Thing" and ta-da! I produced.

* * *

"That's not me, you know."

I didn't jump. "Hard to see that right now."

"Just because you don't think something is true – "

"Doesn't mean that it's not. Great." I blew hair out of my eyes.

"You're falling into your own trap."

"I am not."

"Sure you are. You're putting your faith in things that you shouldn't be. That woman is not me."

I looked to my right, where Leia sat, hands in lap, nails dug into her thighs. She moved her head.

"Lady, I'd love to believe that."

She quirked her lips to the side and narrowed her eyes at me.

I kept going. "Thing is, I _know _you're not her." I glanced at her uncharred stomach. Then looked up at the pyre in front. "You've been dead for two days."

She leaned back. "Death doesn't separate us from who we are."

I looked at her again, noticed a slight carbon smudge on her cheek next to her eye and wanted to take it off. "It does for me."


End file.
